I left Newcastle with nothing but I’m back with a family, a dog and a wine business
‘I’M giving this one to the boss next time I have a bad game,’ jokes former England star Toby Flood as he pulls out a 2015 bottle of ‘Nobody’s Perfect’ sauvignon blanc from his wine collection.
‘Everyone thinks that all wine from Bordeaux is red. It’s not. This one’s from Château de Monfaucon in Grezillac. It was actually launched by an outsider who moved out there.’
With the French adopting a laissez-faire attitude towards training, Flood was afforded plenty of time to perfect his knowledge of the local vineyards during his three seasons with Toulouse.
He returned home last summer as a partner in France’s fourth biggest direct wine seller, 20h33, and is now trying to crack the English market alongside Newcastle’s Premiership push.
At 32, he is one of the club’s senior figures. Newcastle, the English Premiership’s biggest riser over the last four years, and their crusade continues today against Exeter who have suffered two Champions Cup defeats to Leinster this season.
‘We’re slowly getting it right and bringing the right people on board,’ he says of his diversion into wines. ‘We’re a bit like the Newcastle Falcons. We’ve made a couple of errors here and there but we’re picking it up.’
Looking across the Tyne Valley, Flood’s garage is filled with wine bottles and old rugby shirts. It tells the full-circle story of a No 10 who moved from Newcastle to Leicester to Toulouse and – having won 60 caps for England – is now destined to finish his career where it all began in 2004.
‘It’s funny,’ he says. ‘I left my damp, dingy two-bed flat in Newcastle as a 22-year-old with a small car packed with boxes. I came back nine years later with an 18tonne truck, a wife, a kid and a dog. It’s nice to be back. It still seems very much the same. Kingston Park is still Kingston Park.’
Same surroundings, same weather, new faces.
The Falcons were relegated during Flood’s exile but he returned with a grand vision.
‘I remember when Newcastle won the league in 1998; Rob Andrew being carried around,’ he says. ‘Me and my school mates watched Dave Walder score that last-minute try to win the Tetley’s Bitter Cup final in 2001. That inspired us. Can Newcastle win the league again one day? I hope so.
‘We finished eighth last year and I think the next part of our evolution is to be exposed to top-flight European rugby. Even if we sunk in the first four rounds, it would be a huge stepping stone. I remember watching Exeter get pumped by Clermont, but look at them now. You bank that.
‘Exeter are the blueprint for any team. They’ve slowly got better and better. They’ve spent smartly and used the facilities around them. It’s a similar situation with Newcastle.’
Flood wants to recreate the feeling of running out in front of 82,000 supporters at Twickenham. It is still some way off, although last week’s England call-up for flanker Gary Graham, who is also wanted by Scotland, was a reflection of their success at Newcastle.
As for Flood’s own international career, he compares it to a ‘clean and simple’ wine. He remained largely injury free and played under four different coaches – Andy Robinson, Brian Ashton, Martin Johnson and Stuart Lancaster – in eight years, featuring at the 2007 and 2011 World Cup.
‘I had a pretty good swing at it and I loved it,’ he says. ‘It’s funny because I was the saddest person in the world after my first Test. I threw an interception pass and we lost to Argentina for the first time in 482 years or something. My mum wanted a photo in my cap and I was just miserable. My biggest regret is obviously losing that World Cup final in 2007. I look back and think, “I could have retired at 22!” I remember Phil Vickery getting a joke text from Jonno [Martin Johnson] the night before saying, “Don’t even think about it. I’m the only England captain who’s won the World Cup.” ‘The 2011 tournament felt like another big missed opportunity. We were dodging bullets with all the off-field stories but, more so than 2007, we thought, “We’ve got a pretty good chance here”.’ Instead, it ended with England crashing out of the tournament and Manu Tuilagi crashing in to Auckland Harbour off the top of a ferry. ‘Oh, Manu!’ he laughs. ‘We’d gone to Waiheki Island, great for its wine, and on the way out he was telling Louis Deacon about how they always jump off the boat in Samoa. On the way back, we were playing cards and Manu wandered off and said he was going to jump in. We were just like “Yeah, right”. ‘Off came his top and three cards later, watching in disbelief, I just saw this big blur running across the boat and vaulting into the sea. Within half a second a police boat had arrived. I was the first person Jonno called. He just said, “Please tell me this is not true. Why didn’t you stop him?”’ If only Flood knew then what he knows now; it would have been the perfect moment for a bottle of ‘Nobody’s Perfect’.